… well, actually I know I am. Couldn’t be helped, though.
Seriously.
Besides, I couldn’t just show up like that, could I?
And anyway:
Now that I’m here, though …
Top 10 Authors Read: Overall
- Agatha Christie: 157
- William Shakespeare: 83
- Arthur Conan Doyle: 61
- Ngaio Marsh: 45
- Ian Rankin: 42
- Ellis Peters / Edith Pargeter: 30
- Thomas Mann: 28
- Michael Connelly: 26
- Karl May: 26
- Tony Hillerman: 24
- Martha Grimes: 23
- P.D. James: 23
In other words: A serial crime offender reader with occasional, totally overblown delusions of literary grandeur.
The numbers for the top 6 in particular look egregious, of course — the reason being that for Christie, Conan Doyle and Mann I’ve catalogued a substantial number of individual short stories in addition to the respective short story collections; similarly, the figures for Marsh and Rankin include several omnibus volumes in addition to the individual works, and when it comes to Shakespeare … well, let’s just say I’ll buy and read pretty much anything with his name on the cover, which for present purposes includes multiple editions of several of his plays, as well as “topical” editions (say, of quotes and soliloquies), and of course also several omnibus editions.
(Similar considerations — i.e., individual stories / works plus omnibus editions, etc. — also apply further down to the listings for, inter alia, the Brothers Grimm, Edgar Allan Poe, P.D. James, and Jane Austen.)
I really have read the entire fictional / dramatic canon of Shakespeare, Christie and Marsh however, plus all of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes canon, all of Ellis Peters / Edith Pargeter’s Cadfael Chronicles and some of her other historical fiction, and also pretty much everything by Ian Rankin that I’ve been able to get my hands on. (And the same applies, mutatis mutandis, to the authors listed further below for whom I’ve shelved omnibus editions in addition to individual works.)
Top 10 Authors Read: Classics / Literary Fiction
- William Shakespeare: 83
- Thomas Mann: 28
- Charles Dickens: 22
- Friedrich Schiller: 14
- Mark Twain: 14
- Oscar Wilde: 14
- Brothers Grimm: 13
- John Steinbeck: 13
- Henry David Thoreau: 13
- Jane Austen: 12
- Ernest Hemingway: 12
- Naguib Mahfouz: 11
- Edgar Allan Poe: 11
- Wallace Stegner: 11
- Honoré de Balzac: 10
- Iain Pears: 10
- Anthony Trollope: 10
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: 9
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: 9
- Robert Louis Stevenson: 9
- Henry James: 8
- Edna O’Brien: 8
- J.R.R. Tolkien: 8
- Tennessee Williams: 8
Top 10 Authors Read: Mysteries & Crime Fiction
- Agatha Christie: 157
- Arthur Conan Doyle: 61
- Ngaio Marsh: 45
- Ian Rankin: 42
- Ellis Peters / Edith Pargeter: 30
- Michael Connelly: 26
- Tony Hillerman: 24
- Martha Grimes: 23
- P.D. James: 23
- Dorothy L. Sayers: 22
- Rex Stout: 20
Top Authors Read: Historical Fiction*
- Ellis Peters / Edith Pargeter: 30
- René Goscinny & Albert Uderzo (“Asterix”): 18
- Robert van Gulik: 15
- Jean Plaidy: 15
- Naguib Mahfouz: 11
- Iain Pears: 10
- Robert Louis Stevenson: 9
- Alexandre Dumas (père): 7
- C.J. Sansom: 7
- Sharon Kay Penman: 6
- Walter Scott: 6
- Lion Feuchtwanger: 5
Top Authors Read: Drama*
- William Shakespeare: 83
- Friedrich Schiller: 14
- Oscar Wilde: 14
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: 9
- Tennessee Williams: 8
- Bertolt Brecht: 7
- Friedrich Dürrenmatt: 6
- Euripides: 6
- George Bernard Shaw: 6
- Sophocles: 6
- Aeschylus: 5
- Anton Chekhov: 5
Top Authors Read: Children’s / YA Literature / Comics*
- Karl May: 26
- René Goscinny & Albert Uderzo (“Asterix”): 18
- Brothers Grimm: 13
- Magda Trott: 12
- Robert Arthur (“3 Investigators”): 10
- Charles Schulz (“Peanuts”): 10
- Walter Farley: 9
- Otfried Preußler: 8
- Bill Watterson (“Calvin & Hobbes”): 8
- Enid Blyton: 7
- Astrid Lindgren: 7
Top Authors Read: Nonfiction*
- Will Durant (“The History of Civilization” series): 13
- Henry David Thoreau: 13
- Antonia Fraser: 11
- Ralph Waldo Emerson: 9
- Brockhaus (dictionaries): 8
- Moosewood (cookbooks): 8
- Stanley Wells (Shakespeare biographer): 8
- Lesley Mackley (cookbooks): 7
- Hans Silvester (photography): 6
- Richard Surman (photography): 6
- Hilaire Walden (cookbooks): 6
- Jared Diamond: 5
- Christine de Pizan: 5
Top Authors Read: SF / Fantasy / Dystopia*
- Sheri S. Tepper: 15
- J.R.R. Tolkien: 8
- George Orwell: 5
- H.G. Wells: 5
- Tad Williams: 5
… plus C.S. Lewis, whose Chronicles of Narnia I have only shelved as an omnibus edition.
Top 10 English Authors Read
- Agatha Christie: 157
- William Shakespeare: 83
- Ellis Peters / Edith Pargeter: 30
- P.D. James: 23
- Charles Dickens: 22
- Dorothy L. Sayers: 22
- Colin Dexter: 17
- John Mortimer: 16
- Edgar Wallace: 16
- Jean Plaidy: 15
- Jane Austen: 12
- Antonia Fraser: 11
Top Irish and Scottish Authors Read*
- Arthur Conan Doyle: 61
- Ian Rankin: 42
- Oscar Wilde: 14
- Robert Louis Stevenson: 9
- Edna O’Brien: 8
- Walter Scott: 6
- George Bernard Shaw: 6
Top 10 American Authors Read
- Michael Connelly: 26
- Tony Hillerman: 24
- Martha Grimes: 23
- Rex Stout: 20
- Elizabeth George: 15
- Sheri S. Tepper: 15
- Mark Twain: 14
- Will Durant: 13
- Anne Rice: 13
- John Steinbeck: 13
- Henry David Thoreau: 13
- Ernest Hemingway: 12
- Edgar Allan Poe: 11
- Wallace Stegner: 11
- Robert Arthur (“3 Investigators”): 10
- Stephen King: 10
- Charles Schulz (“Peanuts”): 10
Top 10 German (& Swiss) Authors Read
- Thomas Mann: 28
- Karl May: 26
- Friedrich Schiller: 14
- Brothers Grimm: 13
- Magda Trott: 12
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe: 9
- Otfried Preußler: 8
- Brockhaus (dictionaries): 8
- Bertolt Brecht: 7
- Friedrich Dürrenmatt (Swiss): 6
- Wolfgang Ecke: 6
- E.T.A. Hoffmann: 6
- Hans Silvester (photography): 6
- Lion Feuchtwanger: 5
Top Non-English Language & Non-German Authors Read*
- René Goscinny & Albert Uderzo (“Asterix”): 18
- Robert van Gulik: 15
- Naguib Mahfouz: 11
- Honoré de Balzac: 10
- Henning Mankell: 9
- Guy de Maupassant: 7
- Alexandre Dumas (père): 7
- Astrid Lindgren: 7
- Euripides: 6
- Victor Hugo: 6
- Sophocles: 6
- Leo Tolstoy: 6
- Aeschylus: 5
- Anton Chekhov: 5
- Gabriel García Márquez: 5
- Christine de Pizan: 5
- George Sand: 5
__________________________________________
*Note: I didn’t include any authors of whom I have shelved less than 5 books — the list(s) would have been even more endless otherwise.
And just in case anybody’s wondering — yes:
Original post:
http://themisathena.booklikes.com/post/1227202/fashionably-late-to-the-party
